The GeekMom Way to Pamper Yourself for Mother’s Day

Last week was a horrible week for me at work and I was so overwhelmed that I decided to go get a manicure. I’ve been getting my nails done since I was in high school and have always stuck to a very simple french manicure. This time though, I really didn’t want something boring and average. So, I did some research. Initially I was looking for Hello Kitty nail designs (I’m a HUGE fan of that adorable mouthless kitty) but nothing really caught my eye. I switched gears then and started searching for nerdy/geeky nail designs and stumbled upon several different kinds of nail art that would be just perfect for GeekMoms, especially with Mother’s Day right around the corner.

For the Lego afficianados among us: the Lego manicure complete with blocks and Lego logo:

For the superhero fans, why not pay an homage to all your favorites on your corpus unguis?

But if you don’t have time to head over to the nail salon and request any of these outrageously nerdy nails there is an easy DIY manicure that will do the trick. Newsprint Nails (pictured in the beginning of this post) are so easy I could probably have my 17 month old daughter do them for me (except, not really because she’d  probably try to eat the newspaper). I originally found this manicure on a blog called La Passion du Nail Art and the instructions were all in French, with only three years of college French under my belt I copied and pasted the instructions into a word document and hit “translate.”

All you need for these super-easy and totally geeked-out nails are the following materials:

• Nail polish, preferrably in a light or nude tone so the print really shows up
• Alcohol (for some reason the french blog says to use vodka but I just used regualr rubbing alcohol and that worked just fine)
• Newspaper clippings
• Clear topcoat

I had to try this for myself since, when I went to the salon armed with my own newspaper and clear how-to instructions, the manicurist was not too willing to experiment. I went home and tried to dip my already top-coated nails into alcohol and apply the newsprint to get the desired effect. I pressed as hard as I could but still got nothing. Not wanting to ruin a manicure I paid for, I recruited my boyfriend into being my guinea pig. I grabbed a bottle of Pepto-pink nail polish and polished one of his nails with two coats. After letting it dry for a few minutes, I dipped his nail in alcohol and pressed a newspaper clipping to his nail (I chose the crossword puzzle section — but imagine the possibilities; horoscopes, comic strips, sports section what ever suits you best). A few moments later I peeled the clipping away and it did smudge a bit but that’s because I’m overly-enthusiastic and didn’t let the nail dry completely.

Ultimately, the manicure is an exceptionally easy one and it would be something nice to do for yourself for Mother’s Day, or you can get your little geeklings involved if they’re old enough to know not to drink the alcohol or eat the newspaper.

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